


Heart of gold

by killerweasel



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-02
Updated: 2013-02-02
Packaged: 2017-11-27 21:42:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/666803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/killerweasel/pseuds/killerweasel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One small change can lead to a very different outcome.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heart of gold

Title: Heart of gold  
Fandom: Angel  
Characters: Lindsey McDonald, Angel, multiple characters  
Prompt: 094. Make-up.  
Word Count: 1,987  
Rating: R

AU during _Not Fade Away_

**Heart of gold**

Being shot hadn’t the way I’d wanted to go. Cut down by a sword, having my throat torn out, being drained by a vampire, all of those had to be a better death than being executed by a former lounge singer. His hand was shaking just enough for me to know better than to move from where I was standing. If I moved, he might pull the trigger on instinct to protect himself.

“You said you heard me sing. What the fuck did you see, Lorne? Just talk to me for a couple minutes, answer my question, and if you still need to do it, and then pull the damn trigger, but you’d better make sure I’m dead.” Otherwise I was going to get back up and seriously kick his ass.

He closed his eyes, but the gun didn’t lower. “Cupcake, when I came down to talk to you in your cell and you were singing, I saw something. You were standing over Angel. He was asking you to finish the job. There was so much blood, Lindsey. I can’t let you kill him, no matter what kind of mess he’s gotten us into.”

I swallowed a couple of times. “Did he tell you to kill me, Lorne? Or did he say to shoot me? I know you want to do what he said, follow the instructions so you can walk away from this city, walk away from everything that’s been tainted so much it can never be clean again. If he said shoot me, then do it. Otherwise I’m going to walk out that door and meet them in the alley.”

The ground shook, causing Lorne to open his eyes. I swore under my breath. “Do you know what that was? That was the Partners opening the gateway and letting their army through. I’m not talking a dozen guys here. I’m talking a squadron of demons so loyal to the Wolf, the Ram, and the Hart that they would slit their own throats if asked. Angel needs all the help he can get.”

“He doesn’t want your help, gumdrop.” Lorne took a couple of steps forward and started to flex his fingers when the ground trembled again. The gun jerked in his hand and the bullet ended up in my foot instead of my chest.

I howled in pain. My shoe was filling with blood and my foot felt like it was on fire. Lorne stared at me for a moment before dropping the gun to the floor. “They’re meeting by the hotel.” He turned and walked out the door, leaving me alone.

Taking my shoe off to check the damage wasn’t an option. I bent down to pick up the gun, decided that it wouldn’t do me much good, and then I limped over to where I’d left my sword. Then I made my way towards the hotel. Maybe I would get there before everything went to hell.

As I got closer, I could hear the sounds of demons screaming. A roar seemed to shake the sky and it was followed by terrified shrieks. I’d heard the sound before though. They’d unleashed a dragon. The downside to using something like that was they preferred to eat demons over humans. Something about how they crunched better between the dragon’s teeth.

The demons were running by me now. For the most part, I was totally ignored. That was fine by me. That burning feeling in my foot had spread all the way up to my thigh and when I glanced behind me, I saw I’d been bloody footprints behind. Maybe they would have to chop it off if I made it to a hospital. I had a sudden, horrible thought about a matching evil foot to go with my evil hand and shuddered.

I had about three seconds of warning before the dragon came swooping between the buildings as it chased after the retreating demons. Pressing my body up against a wall, I held still until it passed by. I wondered how the media would explain the presence of a forty foot flying reptile and decided they would probably call it a mass hallucination brought on by the apparent earthquakes.

When I was sure it was gone, I started walking again. Bodies littered the ground. Some of them had been toasted by the dragons while others had been hacked up by swords. Then I saw the former street thug. He looked almost as pale as a vampire. I crouched down by his head and pressed my fingers against his throat. There was a pulse, but it was very weak.

His shirt was so stained with blood that it took me a minute to figure out where he was wounded. I yanked his belt off, pulled off my over shirt, and used them to slow the bleeding. There wouldn’t be any help coming, not with the city the way it was. He would just have to hang on.

Leaving him where he was, I moved closer to the building. The former god king was getting to her feet and shot me a glare. I walked around her, looking for the others. She seemed healthy enough; she didn’t need my damn help. Somehow I didn’t think I’d get any from her either. “Make sure the guy over there doesn’t bleed to death.” I didn’t know if she’d do it or not, but I didn’t turn around to look either.

My bad foot connected with the body of a dead demon, causing me to stumble and almost blackout from the pain. I landed on the ground and found myself face to face with Angel. His eyes fluttered open. “You’re supposed to be dead.”

“It didn’t happen. Lorne shot me in the foot and took off. Your friend is going to die without help, Angel. We need to get him inside.” Maybe I could get Illyria to carry him.

Angel groaned while trying to sit up. A look of horror crossed his face. “I can’t feel my legs.”

Shifting my body closer, I sucked in a breath. “Angel, there’s a big piece of steel stinking out of your side; it could have fucked up your spine.”

“Where’s Spike? I remember hearing him scream before everything went away.”

I got up and looked around. A pale hand was sticking out from underneath a pile of bodies. Moving as quickly as I could, I rolled the corpses off of him. “Spike?” There was no response. Then I saw his chest move. “What the fuck?”

Leaning down, I put my hand by his mouth. My jaw dropped when I realized he was breathing. His arm was bleeding rather badly, so I used my belt as a tourniquet. When I pressed my palm to his chest, I could feel his heart beating. “Angel, he’s _alive_.” How in the hell did that happen?

I thought I heard Angel say ‘Shanshu’, but that didn’t make sense to me. Wasn’t that Angel’s thing? His voice shook me from my thoughts. “Get him inside, Lindsey. He’s going to be in shock when he wakes up. I’ll have Illyria help Gunn.”

Right, I’ll just pick him up over my shoulder and carry him like the superman I was. Maybe with the tattoos I could have done it, but not now. I ended up slinging his arm over my shoulder and almost dragging his body into the hotel. He started to stir when I set him not so gently on the floor. Then he gasped, clutching his chest. Spike’s eyes popped open and he looked around wildly. “Something’s wrong with me. It hurts.”

Kneeling down on the floor, I curled my arm around his body as he sat up. “Spike, I need you to close your eyes and take a few deep breaths with me, in and out, nice and slow.” If you hadn’t needed to breath in over a hundred years, suddenly needing to was a shock. Darla had gone through the same thing when she’d woken up human inside of that box. She had to relearn everything.

He did what I asked and I could feel his body start to relax. “Angel said Shanshu. I think the Powers let you become human. Just stay calm, you’re going to be okay. I need to get Angel inside and check on Gunn. Don’t move from that spot or I’ll kick your ass.”

It took a lot of effort to stand again and when I did, I swayed back and forth. I couldn’t feel my foot at all any more, which worried me. As I came up to the door, Illyria came through with Gunn draped over her shoulder. “He still lives, but not for long. The half-breed asked for you.”

I nodded and limped back out to the street. Angel looked worse than the last time I’d seen him. When I started to crouch down, he grabbed my wrist. “Lorne said you were going to kill me, Lindsey. If I asked you to do it, would you?”

My teeth sunk into my bottom lip while I tried not to blurt out anything stupid. “Angel, I could have killed you dozens of times by now and I didn’t. So no, I wouldn’t. And nice of you to have me fucking shot when I was helping for a change. When I get you inside, I’m going to call someone that owes me a favor. We’d never make it to a hospital and Gunn would die before we made it halfway there. I’m going to pretend that you didn’t want me dead. Now grab my neck, lean on me, and I’ll drag your heavy, undead ass into the damn hotel.”

\---

The demon healer was damn good at what he did. Gunn was still unconscious and would stay that way for at least twenty-four hours while his body recovered. Spike’s arm had been repaired. The first thing he’d done when he was healed was walk outside to watch the sunrise. He was still a bit stunned that the Powers had given him a gift.

Illyria vanished during the night. No one saw her leave; no one knew where she’d gone. My foot was going to give me trouble for a while. It had been healed, but I’d limp for at least a couple weeks. Angel... he’d broken his spine. Even though the healer did what he could, it would take weeks, for the nerves to repair themselves.

“Are you still angry at me?”

I set the mug of blood next to his head and stuck in the curly straw. “It’s your fault I have scars on my foot. Other than that, no. At least you’d had Lorne be the trigger man. If it had been anyone else, I’d probably be dead now. He wasn’t holding the gun right.”

Angel motioned for me to sit next to him. “I’m not going to apologize.”

That was fine. As far as I could tell, he never took responsibility for his own actions and found ways to justify whatever the hell he did, even if he only justified it to himself.

“I didn’t really think you would. I’ll stick around until you’re on your feet again. Then I’m going home.” I chewed on my lip. “You could come with me if you want. L.A. is a dead zone right now.”

“Do you mean that?” He seemed surprised.

Was he always this dense or was it only when he had to deal with me? “I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t mean it. Just give it some thought. I need to go check on Gunn and Spike, and then I’ll be back.”

I made it to the door before he called my name. “Yeah?”

“Could you get me some more blood? I’m still hungry.”

“Sure, I’ll grab it on the way back. You’re going to be fine.” I gave him a small smile before walking into the hall.


End file.
